IMS BulletinVolume 33 Issue 4

CONTENTS 2-3 Members’ News;

Contacting the IMS

4 Profi le: C F Jeff Wu

5 IMS Election Results: President-Elect and Council

7 UK Research Assessment; Tweedie Travel Award

8 Mini-meeting Reports

10 Project Euclid & Google

11 Calls Roundup

14 IMS Meetings

20 Other Meetings and Announcements

23 Employment Opportunities

25 International Calendar of Statistical Events

27 Information for Advertisers

July/August 2004 A Message from the (new) President Louis H Y Chen, Director of the Institute

for Mathematical Sciences at the

National University of Singapore, is the

IMS President for 2004–05. He says:

When I was approached by the Committee on Nominations in

January 2003 and asked if I would be willing to be a possible nominee for IMS President-Elect, I felt that it was a great honor for me. However, I could not help but think that the outcome of the nomi-nation process would most likely be a nominee who is based in the US, because, except for Willem van Zwet, Nancy Reid and Bernard Silverman, all the 68 past Presidents of IMS were US-based. When I was fi nally chosen as the nominee for President-Elect, I was pleased, not so much because I was chosen, but because I took it as a sign that the outlook of IMS was becoming more international.

In the year before I succeeded Terry Speed as President in July 2004, IMS forged closer ties and cooperation with the Bernoulli Society, and also organized and planned more meetings outside the US. I am happy that these are happening and I will do whatever I can in my capac-ity as President to continue to develop these eff orts towards internationalism.

But I think that at the same time we should make eff orts to involve more people outside the US in committee work and to serve as offi cers, although the Council and some committees have always had non-US-based members. With more committee members outside the US, IMS can benefi t from new and diff erent perspectives and will be better equipped to serve the world community

of probabilists and statisticians.Although IMS is US-based, its infl u-

ence goes far beyond the US due to its several fi rst-rate publications and many high quality meetings. Also, IMS has reduced membership dues for individuals in developing countries to encourage them to join. But we can do more to help the developing countries, and at the same time publicize IMS and attract more new members, by organizing lectures to large audiences in these countries.

I will introduce a project which I will call the “IMS Lecture Program”, whereby IMS will provide funding for prominent probabilists and statisticians to give lectures in developing countries, targeted at researchers as well as graduate students. Such visits will benefi t a large number of researchers and graduate students in developing countries who cannot aff ord to travel overseas for scientifi c meetings. I hope that this small step by IMS will help warm up the cold climate that has, as Terry alerted us in the last issue, unexpectedly seeped into the scientifi c world. ※

2 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Member News

Contact InformationBulletin Editor Bernard Silverman

Assistant Editor Tati Howell

To contact the IMS Bulletin:

Send by email: bulletin@imstat.orgor mail to:IMS Bulletin20 ShadwellUley, Dursley GL11 5BWUK

To contact the IMS regarding your dues, membership, subscriptions, orders or change of address:

Institute of Mathematical Statistics Dues and Subscriptions Office 9650 Rockville Pike, Suite L2310 Bethesda,MD 20814-3998USAt 301.634.7029f 301.634.7099

e staff@imstat.org

To contact the IMS regarding any other matter, including advertising, copyright permission, offprint orders, copyright transfer, societal matters, meetings, fellows nominations and content of publications:

Executive Director, Elyse Gustafson IMS Business OfficePO Box 22718Beachwood, OH 44122USAt 216.295.2340f 216.295.5661e ims@imstat.org

IMS BulletinVolume 33, Issue 4July/August 2004ISSN 1544-1881

Charles Newman elected to National Academy of Sciences Professor Charles M Newman, Director of the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University, has been elected Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences. He is one of 72 new fellows elected “in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research”. Election to membership in the Academy is considered one of the highest honors that can be accorded a U.S. scientist or engineer. Those elected this year bring the total number of active members to 1,949. The National Academy of Sciences is a private organization of scientists and engineers dedicated to the furtherance of science and its use for general welfare.

David Aldous elected to American Academy of Arts and SciencesDavid Aldous, Professor of Statistics at University of California, Berkeley, has been elected Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is among 178 new Fellows elected this year, bringing current membership to over 4,500—a figure which includes more than 150 Nobel laureates and 50 Pulitzer Prize winners. “I am honored to welcome these outstanding and influential individuals to the nation’s oldest and most illustrious learned society,” said Academy President Patricia Meyer Spacks. “These new members have made extraordinary contributions to their fields and disciplines through their commitment to the advancement of scholarly and creative work in every field and profession.” Election to the Academy has always been one of the highest honors in the United States.

Julian Besag elected Fellow of the Royal SocietyJulian E Besag, Professor of Statistics, University of Washington, has been elected Fellow of the Royal Society. He is one of 44 new Fellows elected this year. His citation reads: “He is distinguished for his pioneering work on the statistical theory and analysis of spatial processes, especially conditional lattice systems. His work has been seminal in recent statistical develop-ments ranging from image analysis to Markov chain Monte Carlo methods”. A profile will appear in the next issue.

Ahuja “a Great Mind”Dr Jagdish Chand Ahuja of Portland State University is listed in the American Biographical Institute’s Great Minds of the 21st Century (2003 Edition) in recognition of his “remarkable achievements in the field of statistical distribution theory”.

Distinguished Professor Cressie Noel Cressie, professor of statistics and director of the Program in Spatial Statistics and Environmental Sciences at The Ohio State University, has been named Distinguished Professor of Mathematical and Physical Sciences at Ohio State.

Belgian Academy honors BrussIMS Fellow Professor F Thomas Bruss has been awarded the 14th Jacques-Deruyts Prize of the Royal Academy of Sciences of Belgium for the period 2000-2004. This Prize is awarded every four years for distinguished contributions to a field of Mathematics. Thomas studied Mathematics in Germany and the UK, and worked in Belgium and USA before being appointed Professor of Mathematics at the Université Libre de Bruxelles in 1993, where he is now Chairman of the Mathematics Department.

His research is in probability models, optimal stopping, limit theorems and branching processes.

IMS Bulletin . 3July/August . 2004

Executive CommitteePresident Terry Speed president@imstat.org

President-Elect Louis Chen president-elect@imstat.org

Past President Raghu Varadhan past-president@imstat.org

Executive Secretary Alicia Carriquiry alicia@iastate.edu

Treasurer Julia Norton jnorton@csuhayward.edu

Program Secretary Andrew Nobel nobel@email.unc.edu

IMS EditorsAnnals of Statistics Morris Eaton eaton@stat.umn.edu & Jianqing Fan jqfan@princeton.edu

Annals of Probability Steven Lalley annals@galton.uchicago.edu

Annals of Applied Probability Robert Adler radler@ie.technion.ac.il

Statistical Science George Casella statsci@stat.ufl.edu

IMS Lecture Notes – Monograph Series Richard Vitale rvitale@uconnvm.uconn.edu

Managing Editor - Statistics Paul Shaman shaman@wharton.upenn.edu

Managing Editor - Probability Michael Phelan phelan@chapman.edu

Electronic Journal of Probability Ted Cox ejp@math.washington.edu

Electronic Communications in Probability Martin Barlow ecp@math.washington.edu

Managing Editor - EJP/ECP Zhenqing Chen ejpecp@math.washington.edu

IMS Bulletin Bernard Silverman & Tati Howell bulletin@imstat.org

Web Editor Hemant Ishwaran ishwaran@bio.ri.ccf.org & Arti Ishwaran imswebmaster@imstat.org

Production Editor Patrick Kelly pkelly@wharton.upenn.edu

Associate Program Secretary Maury Bramson bramson@math.umn.edu

We regret to announce the deaths of three IMS Fellows: Joseph L Doob, I Richard Savage and Seymour

Geisser. Their obituaries will appear in future issues.

Honorary Doctor of Science for Leo GoodmanThe University of Michigan has conferred on IMS Fellow Leo A Goodman an honor-ary Doctor of Science degree for his “major contributions to statistics and social and behavioral science, and in particular for his development of new methods for the analysis of survey data as a sophisticated branch of statistical science.” In his long career, Leo Goodman has had a profound impact on methods of statistical analysis used in the social and behavioral sciences. In particular, he has played an important role in elevating the analysis of survey data from an art-form to a sophisticated and rigorous branch of statistical science. His work has funda-mentally transformed quantitative research methods in the social sciences, particularly in sociology, by providing a set of interre-lated statistical tools that enable researchers to examine qualitative/categorical data with scientific rigor. His introduction and further development of these and related tools have led to revolutionary changes in the methods now used in social science research involv-ing categorical data. Professor Goodman is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society; Other honors include awards from ASA, the American Sociological Association and COPSS.

Member News

Statisticians Honored at RochesterW Jackson Hall and Siddhartha Dalal were among four honorees at the Doctoral Degrees Ceremony at the University of Rochester on May 15. Hall, an IMS mem-ber for 53 years and a Fellow for 37, was given the University Award for Lifetime Achievement in Graduate Education. He was cited for his 35 years of mentoring graduate students in statistics at the University. Each of Hall’s PhD recipients over the years, as well as his post-docs and other mentored graduate students, had written in support of his nomination for this award. Dalal, who earned MBA (1973) and PhD (1975) degrees at Rochester and is now a Vice President at Xerox Corporation, was one of two recipients of the Rochester Distinguished Scholar Award. He was cited for his accomplishments in research and in research administration. Jack Hall cur-rently holds a part-time appointment at the University’s Department of Biostatistics and Computational Biology, devoting time to continuing research and graduate teaching and serving as statistician for a series of clinical trials in cardiology. IMS recently published a festschrift in his honor, IMS Lecture Notes Monograph Series 43, 2003 (see http://www.imstat.org/publications/lecnotes.

htm).

Keith Worsley named 2004 SSC Gold MedalistThe Statistical Society of Canada has awarded its 2004 Gold Medal to Keith Worsley, James McGill Professor at the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, McGill University. The medal, intended to honor current leaders in their fields, is awarded to a person who has made substantial contributions to statistics or probability, either to mathematical developments or in applied work. Keith received his PhD from Auckland University, New Zealand, in 1978 and has taught at McGill since. His research interests are concerned with the geometry of random images in astrophysics, and brain mapping. He has published over 120 papers in statistical and medi-cal journals, and has supervised six PhD students and four MSc students since 1997.

4 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

C F Jeff Wu: a ProfileC F Jeff Wu, Coca Cola Chair Professor in Engineering Statistics

at Georgia Institute of Technology, was elected to the National

Academy of Engineering (NAE) in 2004. He is one of few statisti-

cians ever elected to the NAE (others including Deming and

Juran), and the first academic statistician to have received this

honor. Randy R Sitter and Boxin Tang, of Simon Fraser University,

write:

A complete enumeration of Jeff’s accom-plishments would be impossible in this profile, so we will constrain ourselves to mentioning a few highlights. Receiving his PhD from UC Berkeley in 1976, Jeff has since been a Professor at the University of Wisconsin, Professor and GM/NSERC Chair in Quality and Productivity at the University of Waterloo, H C Carver Professor and Chair at the University of Michigan, prior to his recent appointment as the Coca Cola Chair Professor at Georgia Tech. Jeff is the 1987 winner of the COPSS Presidents Award. He co-authors with Mike Hamada the award-winning book Experiments: Planning, Analysis, Parameter Design Optimization (Wiley 2000). In addition, Jeff’s research has been recognized both as a body of work and for specific con-tributions, winning numerous awards. He is listed as an ‘ISI Highly Cited Researcher’ in 2002-03 on www.isihighlycited.com. You can read more about his accomplishments and his remarkable journey as a statistician at http://www.gatech.edu/news-room/

release.php?id=236 and http://www.isye.

gatech.edu/~jeffwu.Few would question that Jeff is one of

the top researchers in statistics worldwide. His research contributions are broad and deep. His publications range from theo-retical to applied, and from mathematical statistics to engineering statistics to survey sampling to medical statistics. Jeff is a profound thinker. He (with Hamada) proposed a paradigm shift for designs with complex aliasing. This seminal paper shows that such designs allow estimation of both main effects and interactions, a breakaway

from the traditional wisdom that only main effects can be estimated. The work has stimulated much later develop-ment and its full impact is yet to be seen. Never one to stand still in the face of rapid change, Jeff continues to grow and impact new areas of research in engineering, statis-tics and other related fields.

Even with all of his research, all of his awards and all of his more recognized accomplishments, Jeff Wu may even surpass these in his role as a great teacher.

His record speaks for itself. He has supervised 30 PhD students, of whom 16 are teaching in major research universities in statistics, engineering or business in US/Canada and abroad, and two are senior VP’s in major US companies. He is well known for his ability to recruit good students, but even in this regard is likely underrated in his ability to identify different types of tal-ent and the promise of creativity in students that others miss.

What is less known about him is his unique set of characteristics in bringing out the best and taking his students to a higher level. He produces good students by instilling certain key ingredients at the right times, by reinforcing and encouraging their strengths and by subtly steering them away from routes that do not well-match their

abilities. Jeff expects a lot, but also goes the distance himself. One of us [BT] vividly remembers the time when Jeff picked him up at the Toronto International Airport on Christmas Day of 1988 when he first arrived in Canada.

Jeff is a motivator. As his student you feel motivated and energized after each research meeting with him, although at times you may not know exactly what to do. Then you will read, think, and read again, until you start doing something. Depending on your style, you may follow a different path, perhaps that of thinking-reading-thinking-computing-conjectur-ing-proving. Whatever your style, your personality or your demeanor, the fact of matter is, you work harder, more efficiently and are more creative following a meeting with Jeff.

He knows your strengths better than you do. At any given time, Jeff typically has 3-5 PhD students. He has the right research topic for everyone. He does not just give

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 5

you a research topic. Rather he talks about the importance and potential of a research area, and you typically leave his offi ce with several papers: his work and others’, at that time likely not knowing or admitting that you are being directed into a certain research area that best fi ts your strengths. Th e realization often comes afterwards. He believes in you even when you have doubts. His exuberance for your ideas brings out your best.

He cultivates your scientifi c mind. One of the challenges we all face as young researchers after our PhD is to establish an independent research program. Jeff understands this and prepares his students well and selfl essly. Scientifi c inquiry means much more than problem solving and solution implementation. It means problem formulation and identifi cation. It also means conceptualizing and theorizing the current fi ndings. You learn all these from him, especially from his classifi cation theory of research problems.

Th is is Jeff Wu the research professor, the teacher, the professional, but Jeff is also a likeable, amusing person. At a dinner of 10, he can simultaneously hold conversa-tions with everyone around the table; one minute chatting with one person or group and the next with another, and yet picking up the conversation from where it is left when he returns, charming all. It seems that he is moving freely among several parallel universes! When Jeff visited me [BT] in Memphis in 2000, I had devised a plan of where to eat and do sight-seeing. Upon Jeff ’s arrival, I discovered that Jeff knew more about the local restaurants and attrac-tions. I felt slightly disappointed, having a hard time giving up my beautiful plan. But not before long, I found I was enjoying myself because I had become Jeff ’s guest and he was showing me around! Th is is a common story among Jeff ’s friends, col-leagues and former students. We never tire of any time spent with him, never fail to be energized, encouraged and motivated. ※

We are pleased to announce the results of the recent IMS Council elections.

Th e new IMS President-Elect is Th omas G Kurtz, University of Wisconsin, Madison. Tom will follow Louis Chen into the

role of IMS President. He says he is honored to serve IMS in this way. “Th e fi elds of statistics and probability that come together to form the IMS are changing rapidly,” he asserts. “Statistics has become more computational and less probability based than has traditionally been the case. At the same time, probability has become central to many areas of application beyond classical statistics. Yet the two fi elds remain joined on the tongue—if not at the hip—in the minds of many of our colleagues in other fi elds, and I believe that it is to our advantage scien-tifi cally and professionally to continue to foster and strengthen this close associa-tion.”

Elected to IMS Council for 2004–07 are Erwin Bolthausen, Nancy Flournoy, Xuming He, Susan Holmes, and Michael Steele; also Th omas DiCiccio who will serve on Council 2004–06. Th ey will be taking up their new positions at the Annual Meeting in Barcelona. Th e ‘departing’ council members at this year’s Annual Meeting are Wilfrid Kendall, Th omas Liggett, Wing Wong, Michael Woodroofe, and Bin Yu (and Jianqing Fan who left in January to become the one of the Co-Editors of Th e Annals of Statistics).

Th e election process went smoothly this year, with online voting now in its third year. IMS Web Editor Hemant Ishwaran and Webmaster Arti Ishwaran said the response to online voting from members had been “very positive”, with over three quarters of voting members using this method in preference to paper ballots. Th is year 77.5 per cent of votes were cast online, up very slightly from last year. 917 votes were cast, which is just over a fi fth of the total membership. Th e proportion of members who voted, however, was lower this year than last year.

Members this year will have received personalized emails with their member ID ready pre-fi lled, to make online vot-ing easier.

Comments on the election process may be made to Elyse Gustafson, IMS Executive Director, at erg@imstat.org ※

IMS Elections

200420042004

IMS Election Results

“Statistics and probability:

joined at the tongue”

– THOMAS G KURTZ, IMS PRESIDENT-ELECT

IMS Council Members 2003–04:

Wilfrid Kendall, Thomas

Liggett, Wing Wong, Michael

Woodroofe, Bin Yu, Alan Karr,

J Steve Marron, Per Mykland,

David W Scott, Jane-Ling Wang,

Jianqing Fan, Richard Gill, Hans

R Künsch, Christian P Robert

and Ruth J Williams

6 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

SERIES A: Statistics in SocietyEdited by N. G. Best, J. Haigh and P. LynnStatistics in Society publishes papers that demonstrate clear statistical thinking on issues of importance to society.

www.blackwellpublishing.com/RSSA

SERIES B: Statistical MethodologyEdited by R. Henderson and A. T. A. WoodStatistical Methodology has a long tradition of publishing work at the leading edge of methodologicaldevelopment, with a strong emphasis on relevance to statistical practice.

www.blackwellpublishing.com/RSSB

SERIES C: Applied StatisticsEdited by C. A. Glasbey, G. Molenberghs and A. J. WatkinsApplied Statistics of international repute for statisticians both inside and outside the academic world.

www.blackwellpublishing.com/RSSC

NEW IN 2004

Edited by Helen Joyce

Significance is a new quarterly magazine for anyone interested in statistics and the analysis

and interpretation of data. It aims to communicate and demonstrate, in an entertaining and

thought-provoking way, the practical use of statistics in all walks of life and to show how

statistics benefit society.

Articles are largely non-technical and hence accessible and

appealing, not only to

members of the profession, but to all users of statistics.

As well as promoting the discipline and covering topics of professional

relevance, Significance contains a mixture of statistics in the news, case-studies, reviews of

existing and newly developing areas of statistics, the application of techniques in practice and

problem solving, all with an international flavour.

www.blackwel lpubl i sh ing.com/SIGN

SpecialIntroductory Offer:

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Plus Great Discountsfor Students!

The Journal of the RoyalStatistical SocietyRanked in the ISISocial Sciences Citation Index

Increasing to 4 issues

in 2004

Visit the journal homepages for further

information including submission guidelines,

subscription information and details of how

to obtain a free sample copy.

The new magazine of the Royal Statistical Society

RSS/SIGN Ad 190 x 203 6/21/04 9:53 AM Page 1

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 7

weight far beyond the funding implications. With every cycle of assessment, universities have given the exercise greater importance, and increasingly they use grades for far-reaching policy decisions. Aiming for the next exercise has become a major focus of strategy on initiatives, appointments, funding and organisation. The RAE has a great impact on recruitment and pro-

motion of academic staff.The next RAE will be in 2008. For the first time, the grading will be a

‘quality profile’, a density estimate instead of a point estimate(!) to discourage game-playing about who should or should not be included. There will still be peer review by expert panels in approximately the same number of disciplines. It is claimed that there will be more emphasis on applied and cross-disciplin-ary research; and increased freedom of panels to adapt criteria, and the use of quantitative performance measures, to the needs of their disciplines. As at present, the financial implications of the gradings will not be known ahead of the assessment. The estimated cost, centrally and in universities, of the next exercise will be 0.6% of the amount of research money that will be allocated in consequence. To read more, see http://www.rae.ac.uk

Naturally, the RAE is controversial. In Statistics & OR, one of the smaller units of assessment, the integrity and professional judgement of the panels

have never been questioned, and the results are widely, though not universally, respected. However, this is not the case for all disciplines.

But even if the assessments are fair, does the system encourage good research by targeting limited funds to the right places? Has the ratchet of selectivity turned far enough, or too far? Does the system encourage game-playing by institutions? Does it encourage or demoralise strong researchers? And if this is not the right approach to funding research across a very hetero-geneous university system, what is? ※

The Future of UK Research Assessment

Peter Green writes: At intervals of about four years, universities in the United Kingdom are subjected to a Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), with the declared aim of the selective distribution of government research funds. (This is separate from the project-oriented funding from the research councils). In the 2001 RAE, about 70 peer-review panels assessed the research work at all universities in their particular disciplines, of which Statistics and Operational Research was one. The review is based on rigidly structured written submissions with the main focus on each researcher’s “best” four publications. There is also a departmental tabulation of research student numbers and grant income, and the narrative presentation of indicators of esteem, overall research activ-ity and future plans.

The published grades, on a 7-point scale, are jealously debated, and naturally carry

Tweedie New Researcher Award

Call for Nominations

Richard Lewis Tweedie played a significant role throughout his professional career in mentoring young colleagues at work and through professional society activities. With funds donated by his friends and family, we are pleased to announce the creation of the Tweedie New Researcher Award.

The purpose is to fund travel to pres-ent the “Tweedie New Researcher Invited Lecture” at the IMS New Researchers Conference. For the purpose of the award, a new researcher is within ten years of the completion of their doctoral degree. Nominees should be members of the IMS at time of nomination. Up to US $2000 per award will be granted, to be reimbursed

against receipts. Only one award may be made.

Nomination Process:

Please send six collated copies of the completed nomination form (available from http://www.imstat.org/awards/tweedie.html) extended abstract, CV and two letters of recommendation, by October 1, 2004 to:

Tweedie Award NominationInstitute of Mathematical Statistics3163 Somerset DrShaker Heights OH 44122Applications will be reviewed by

the IMS Committee on Travel Awards. Nominators and the recipient will be noti-fied in early January. ※

8 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Survey Sampling Mini-meeting ReportPartha Lahiri and Tathagata Banerjee

report on the IMS-SRMS Joint Mini Meeting

on Current Trends in Survey Sampling

and Official Statistics, which took place in

Raichak, India from January 1–3, 2004:

The joint mini-meeting on Current Trends in Survey Sampling and Official Statistics was held on January 1-3, 2004 at the Ffort Radisson hotel on the banks of the river Hooghly near Kolkata (Calcutta), India. This was the first mini-meeting spon-sored jointly by IMS and the SRMS, and was intended to serve as a bridge between mathematical statisticians and practitioners working on sample surveys and official sta-tistics. The mini-meeting was co-sponsored by the US Census Bureau, Gallup Research Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the Department of Statistics, University of Calcutta.

About sixty people from six different countries attended the mini-meeting. Fifteen researchers presented their papers in invited sessions: Jana Asher, William R Bell, F Jay Breidt, Jai Won Choi, Stephen Fienberg, David F Findley, Wayne A Fuller, Malay Ghosh, JK Ghosh, Phillip S Kott, Michael D Larsen, Seppo Laaksonen, Michel Mouchart, Ralf Munnich, and Rajendra P Singh.

A special attraction of this mini-meeting was a poster session held in the evening of January 2. Thirteen posters were displayed in an informal setting and refreshments were served during the session. Many students and young researchers presented their research in this session. There were no parallel sessions in the entire meeting, which gave participants the opportunity to attend all sessions, including the poster session. The invited sessions and the poster session together covered a wide range of topics including calibration, data collection, measurement error modeling, small area estimation, statistical disclosure limitation, time series modeling, record linkage and variance estimation. The meeting papers can be found under meeting proceedings at http://www.jpsm.umd.edu/ims.

Delicious Indian foods and drinks were served throughout the meeting, including a typical Bengali lunch at the end of the meeting. Right after the poster session on January 2, there was a cultural program featuring an Indian classical dance. A post meeting tour of Kolkata was organized especially for the foreign visitors.

The Executive Committee members—Tathagata Banerjee, Saibal Chattopadhyay (Chair), Partha Lahiri and Rahul Mukerjee—wish to thank Gourangadeb Chattopadhyay, Sugata Sen Roy, the orga-nizers of different invited sessions, many graduate students of Calcutta University who helped the organization of the meeting and the participants, especially those who came from far away. The meeting was a grand success!

Informal discussions over lunch

Site of the meeting: River Hooghly

Sequential Analysis Journal: Call for PapersThe twenty-third volume of Sequential Analysis (http://www.dekker.com/servlet/product/productid/SQA) is publish-ing all four issues for the year 2004 to celebrate the centenary of Abraham Wald’s birth. These issues are appro-priately labeled as “Abraham Wald Centennial Celebration: Invited Papers” on the cover. The first two centennial issues have already appeared in print.

The journal now has a bold and attractive layout and it has revamped the “aims and scopes” to embrace new and emerging areas in statistics. Under the editorship of Nitis Mukhopadhyay, the editorial board, with many new members, consists of Associate Editors from Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, England, Germany, India, Japan, Korea, Sweden, Taiwan and USA. All submissions are refereed. We are pleased to report that most cor-responding authors receive the first set of reports within three months.

Original research articles, applied and methodological articles, review articles, articles with invited discussants, and case-study reports (PDF or Word) should be sent to the Editor (mukhop@uconnvm.uconn.edu). If you have an idea for a special issue of Sequential Analysis focusing on a current topic of interest, the Editor would love to hear from you.

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 9

For its second meeting, the Young Researchers’ Day of Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium, received the support of IMS. This mini-meeting took place on April 30, 2004 on the topic “Many explanatory variables? A challenge for regression modelling”. In other words, we concentrated on various issues around regression modelling with a lot of explanatory variables. The ques-tions included the selection of explanatory variables, the estimation of the regression function, how to test the structure of the

regression function, the subsequent problem of curse of dimensionality, and so on. The day was divided into two parts: one session addressed the problem semi-parametrically (e.g. using the single index model) and the second one focused on the nonparametric approach.

The Young Researchers’ Days are one-day meetings fully organized by the PhD students of the Graduate School of Statistics of the Institute of Statistics (Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium). This year, 15 PhD students worked together to organize the meeting. In each session, the idea is to listen a leading expert and three young speakers on their own research in that field. Each speaker (including young speakers!) has a long time to explain his or her research, and special attention is paid to discussions between the workshop participants.

86 people participated in this meet-

ing, including 55 doctoral or post-doc-toral students from Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Spain, Switzerland, The Netherlands and United Kingdom. Most of the participants appreciated the homogene-ity of the programme, and the “rhythm” of the meeting, allowing them to understand the talks in more depth. With this work-shop, the participants met researchers work-ing in their statistical field, including young researchers and researchers from industry (five participants came from biomedi-cal industries and two from engineering industries in information technologies). In particular, it stimulated discussions between young researchers from different universities in the region.

All participants also appreciated the support of IMS, and all students were warmly invited to take the opportu-nity to join the society for free.

More details about this meeting can be found at http://www.stat.ucl.ac.be/yrd.

Céline Bugli & Sébastien Van Bellegem, Institute of Statistics,

Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium

Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential AnalysisWith the permission and some financial support from the Wald family and other con-tributors, the Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis has been established. It will be awarded for the best judged published article in the premier journal in this field, Sequential Analysis [see left]. This prestigious prize will be awarded in the spring of each year, starting in 2005, taking into account all articles published in SA during the preced-ing calendar year.

The Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis may include a combination of a certificate, a modest honorarium, and electronic subscription to the journal for a year. Multiple authors of a winning publication may share the honorarium and electronic journal subscription. In the future, this prize may be combined with a special “Sequential Analysis Lecture” during some annual statistical event.

An account dedicated to the Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis has been established within the Department of Statistics at the University of Connecticut, Storrs. Everyone interested in fostering this prize is earnestly requested to make tax-free contribu-tions to this fund as generously as they can. Checks should be drawn in favor of “The University of Connecticut” with a note “Abraham Wald Prize in Sequential Analysis” written in the memo portion and be mailed to:

Nitis Mukhopadhyay, Department of Statistics, University of Connecticut, CLAS Building, U-4120, 215 Glenbrook Road, Storrs, CT 06269-4120, U.S.A.

Report on the IMS Young Researchers’ Day

The meeting was well-attended

Coffee-time discussions

Welcoming committee

HOST AN IMS MINI-MEETINGIMS can provide funds, publicity

and support to help promote short scientific meetings organized by its

members. See http://www.imstat.org/

program/minimeeting.htm

10 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Terry Ehling is the Executive Director of Project Euclid. She reports here on a new joint venture Project Euclid are

undertaking with the Google™ internet search engine:

Project Euclid is pleased to announce that we have allowed Google™ to download and index full-text articles in Euclid database. Based on the experiences of similar content providers, we expect this will significantly increase the visibility of articles in Project Euclid, making their discovery easier for Internet users. Scholarly content providers who have permitted Google™ to crawl their sites have reported upwards of a four-fold increase in user traffic since permitting Google™ to index full-text of their articles. Google™ will not cache any full-text content on their servers. Search results in Google™ will direct users back to article abstract pages in Euclid. User access to full-text will be subject to the same restrictions as are currently in place.

Google™ is confident that they can provide better information retrieval services using full-text rather than rely-ing on the publicly available bibliographic information only. We think this will be especially true for those Euclid titles that do not use abstracts. Euclid and Google™ believe that there is potentially relevant material within the full-text that is not referenced in the bibliographic data and that indexing this ‘hidden’ material will provide the user with a richer discovery experience.

Project Euclid is online at http://projecteuclid.org. Project Euclid’s mission is “to advance scholarly communica-tion in the field of theoretical and applied mathematics and statistics. Project Euclid is designed to address the unique needs of low-cost independent and society journals. Through a collaborative partnership arrangement, these publishers join forces and participate in an online presence with advanced functionality, without sacrificing their intellectual or economic independence or commitment to low subscription prices. Full-text searching, reference linking, interoperability through the Open Archives Initiative, and long-term retention of data are all important components of the project.”

Google™ (http://www.google.com) is a trademark of Google Inc.

Project Euclid announces…

Free IMS Journals: a reminderElectronic access to all IMS journals is FREE for all IMS indi-

vidual members, regardless of which print journal you subscribe to, through either Project Euclid (for issues from 1996 onwards) or JSTOR (for issues before 1997).

If your institution is a subscriber and you are using an institu-tional computer, you should have access. If you are a subscriber to any IMS journal, you can have access, but you must register first. So if you haven’t already done so, you can set up your electronic access online: instructions are at http://www.imstat.org/publications/

eaccess.htm

For Project Euclid access, you’ll need your IMS membership ID to use as your ‘subscriber code’. This is the number which is printed on the mailing label on your journals (including the IMS Bulletin) or you can get it by contacting the IMS with your full name and institution.

For JSTOR (http://www.jstor.org) access, contact IMS ims@imstat.org with your full name, institution and email address.

Past IMS Bulletin Editors

Leo Katz (1972-74);

Dorian Feldman (1975-80);

William C Guenther (1981-86);

George P H Styan (1987-92);

Susan R Wilson (1992-97);

Dipak K Dey (1998-2001)

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 11

Geert Molenberghs Named Myrto Lefkopoulou Distinguished Lecturer at Harvard School of Public HealthThe Department of Biostatistics, Harvard School of Public Health, has named Geert Molenberghs, PhD, Professor of Biostatistics at the Center for Statistics, Limburgs Universitair Centrum, as the 2004 Myrto Lefkopoulou Distinguished Lecturer. Professor Molenberghs will present a lecture on Thursday, September 30 at Harvard School of Public Health. The lecture, “Handling Incomplete Data in Longitudinal Studies”, will be followed by a reception.

The lectureship was established in perpetuity in memory of Dr Myrto Lefkopoulou, a faculty member and graduate of Harvard School of Public Health. Dr Lefkopoulou, much loved by friends, students and faculty, died of cancer in 1992 at the age of 34 after a courageous two-year battle.

Each year the Myrto Lefkopoulou Lectureship is awarded to a promising statistician who has made contributions to either col-laborative or methodologic research in the applications of statistical methods to biology or medicine and/or has shown excellence in the teaching of biostatistics. Ordinarily, the lectureship is given to a statistician within 15 years of receiving an earned doctorate. Previous recipients of the Lefkopoulou Memorial Lectureship have been Michael Boehnke, Ronald S Brookmeyer, Brad Carlin, Marie Davidian, Steven N Goodman, Trevor Hastie, Danyu Lin, Hans-Georg Mueller, Giovanni Parmigiani, Kathryn Roeder, and Louise Ryan.

Call for Nominations

Nominations for next year’s lectureship are welcome and should be sent to:

The Myrto Lefkopoulou Lecture Committee, Department of Biostatistics, Harvard School of Public Health, 655 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115. Nominations should include a letter of nomination and a CV.

The deadline for submission of nominations is March 15, 2005.

C R and Bhargavi Rao Prize for Outstanding Research in StatisticsThe C R and Bhargavi Rao Prize is established to honor and recognize outstanding and influential innovations in the theory and practice of mathematical statistics, international leadership in directing statistical research, and pioneering contributions by a rec-ognized leader in the field of statistics. The Rao Prize is awarded by the Department of Statistics at Penn State University to a nominee selected by the members of the Rao Prize Committee.

The 2003 prize was awarded to Bradley Efron, the Max H. Stein Professor in the Department of Statistics at Stanford University.

The Rao prize shall be awarded every two years (odd numbered years) to an individual working in the United States. The award recipient will receive a medal, cash prize and an invitation to visit Penn State and give a talk.

Nominations for the 2005 Rao Prize should be submitted by December 1, 2004 to:

Chair, Rao Prize Selection Committee326 Thomas Building Penn State University University Park, PA 16802-2111 Nominations should include a letter describing the nominee’s

outstanding contributions to leadership and research in statistics, a current curriculum vita, and two supporting letters.

C R Rao held the Eberly Chair in Statistics at Penn State University from 1988-2001. He now serves as Holder Emeritus of the Eberly Chair in Statistics. He was the founding Director of the Center for Multivariate Analysis. A President’s National Medal of Science Laureate, Dr Rao is recognized worldwide as one of the pioneers of modern statistical theory and as one of the world’s top five statisticians, with multifaceted distinctions as a mathematician, researcher, scientist, and teacher. His pioneering contributions to mathematics and statistical theory and applications have become part of undergraduate and graduate courses in statistics, econo-metrics, electrical engineering, and many other disciplines at most universities throughout the world.

A summary of ‘Calls’ in this issue:Papers/Posters: IMS-CSPS Joint Meeting, Beijing, p16; 2nd Workshop on Monte Carlo Methods,

Harvard, p20; GENSIPS2005, Newport RI, p21; Sequential Analysis (journal papers), p8 Travel Awards: Tweedie New Researcher Award, for IMS New Researchers’ Conference, p7;

IMS-ISBA “MCMSki” meeting, Italy, p18Other Awards: Nominations for Myrto Lefkopoulou Distinguished Lecturer (above);

C R & Bhargavi Rao Prize (above)

Calls for Nominations

12 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Meet the MembersThree more long-standing and new members tell us some interesting things:

Agathe GuillouxPhD student at

CREST-ENSAI /

Université de Rennes

1 / Université de

Paris-Sud - Orsay

Member of IMS for 6

months.

If you could have dinner with someone famous, living or deceased, who would it be? Henri Poincarré and Woody Allen (together!)What is the last book you read? To have and have not by Ernest Hemingway.What did you do last Saturday? I went to the Georges Pompidou Center (Paris, France) and had dinner with some friends.You have unlimited funds for a one week dream vacation, where would you go? Sri LankaTell us something that others might find surprising about you. I am a shoes addict!

omas G. KurtzProfessor of Mathematics and Statistics

at University of Wisconsin - Madison (and

the new IMS President-Elect: see page 5);

Member of IMS for 37 years

If you could have dinner with someone famous, living or deceased, who would it be? Harry Truman (we’re both from Missouri)What is the last movie you saw? Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (on the opening day)What did you do last Saturday? Worked on AoP submissions (yes, really), shopped for an HDTV (virtually on the Web), and goofed off with three of my grandchildren.

You have unlimited funds for a one week dream vacation, where would you go? A large house on a beach with a porch that has a great view (good place to do mathematics) and enough activities in the neighborhood to keep the grandchildren happy.Tell us something that others might find surprising about you? I once lost an election for the Dane County Board of Supervisors.

Mike EvansProfessor of

Statistics at the

University of

Toronto.

Member of IMS

“since about 1977”.

If you could have dinner with someone famous, living or deceased, who would it be?Isaac Newton, not because I have anything specific to ask him, but I think he was one of the most influential people who have ever lived and it wouldbe interesting to discover something about what he was like as a person. Based on a biography I read of him a few years ago, I think the dinner would probably be fairly nerve-wracking.What is the last book you read?I recently finished the book The Beatles as Musicians: The Quarry Men through Rubber Soul by Walter Everett. Its an analysis of the Beatles’ musicfrom an arranger’s point-of-view.What did you do last Saturday?It was a fairly unusual Saturday as I went to a clinic held by Barry Harris: a great, bebop-style jazz pianist whose career dates back to the origins of that style. He holds these in Toronto a couple of times a year.

You have unlimited funds for a one week dream vacation, where would you go?I’d take my wife and daughter with me on a skiing vacation somewhere in Switzerland.Tell us something that others might find surprising about you?I like to play guitar and in a jazz context. I’m not particularly expert, but I enjoy the study of it and playing with others.

Sven RahmannGroup Leader

‘Algorithms and

Statistics for

Systems Biology’

at Faculty of

Technology,

University of

Bielefeld, Germany;

joined IMS this year.

If you could have dinner with someone famous, living or deceased, who would it be? At the moment, I feel compelled to have dinner with Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and talk with him about the future of my generation.What is the last book you read or movie you saw? Book: The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown; movie: Kill Bill Vol. 2 by Quentin TarrantinoWhat did you do last Saturday? A lazy day; my wife and I decorated our new flat, went to the local coffee house and went out for dinner in the eveningYou have unlimited funds for a one week dream vacation, where would you go? A gourmet trip to ThailandTell us something that others might find surprising about you? If I told you, it would spoil the surprise...

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 13

14 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Barcelona: 67th IMS Annual Meeting 2004

IMS Meetings around the world

World Bernoulli CongressHeld in conjunction with the 67th IMS Annual MeetingJuly 26–31, 2004, Barcelona, Spainhttp://www.imub.ub.es/events/wc2004/index.html

Final program is available to download at the conference website. Please browse the rest of the website for other information. We remain at your disposal if you need any further help or special assistance: contact email wc2004@imub.ub.es

Looking forward to seeing you in Barcelona!David Nualart, Chair of the Organizing Committee

Special invited lectures Iain Johnstone (IMS Wald Lectures, 3 sessions)Peter Bickel (IMS Rietz Lecture): Th e frontiers of statistics and computer science IMS Medallion Lectures:Alison Etheridge: Some mathematical problems from population geneticsVladimir Koltchinskii: Data Dependent Complexities and Oracle Inequalities in Statistical Learning Th eoryDominique Picard: What do we learn from Maxisets?Cun-Hui Zhang: Recent results in nonparametric regression and empirical BayesBernoulli Lectures:David Aldous (Kolmogorov Lecture): Scaling exponents and random combinatorial opti-mization: fi fteen variations on the Beardwood-Halton-Hammersley theorem. Wendelin Werner (Lévy Lecture)Jun Liu (Bernoulli Lecture)Steff en Lauritzen (Laplace Lecture)

rest of the website for other information. We remain at your disposal if you need any

Scaling exponents and random combinatorial opti-

IMS Co-sponsored Meeting:

2004 Joint Statistical MeetingsAugust 8 - 12, 2004Toronto, Ontario, Canada“Statistics as a Unifi ed Discipline”IMS Program Chair: Michael Evans, mevans@utstat.utoronto.

ca, University of Toronto, Canada; IMS Contributed Paper Chair: Tim Swartz, tim@stat.sfu.ca, Simon Fraser University, Canada. Co-sponsored by ASA, IMS, ENAR, WNAR, SSC.

IMS Co-sponsored Meeting:

2005 Joint Statistical MeetingsAugust 7–11, 2005Minneapolis, MNTh e theme will be “Using our Discipline to Enhance Human Welfare”. More information in the next issue.

Organizing a meeting? Tell us about it!

Send your announcement

to ims@imstat.org

IMS Bulletin . 15

IMS Welcome ReceptionJSM 2004

New Members, New Graduates and StudentsAll members who have joined the IMS during the past two years, all IMS New Graduate members and all IMS student members are encouraged to attend. Appetizers and an open bar will be available.

If you wish to join the IMS, but haven’t, please come by the reception and we will have applications available, or you can join on-line at www.imstat.org

IMS Member SocialJSM 2004

Time and Date TBA: Watch the JSM program for more information

All IMS members are welcome.Th is is an opportunity to see old friends, network with colleagues and relax in an intimate setting. Appetizers and drinks will be served.

If you wish to join the IMS, but haven’t, please come by the reception and we will have applications available, or you can join online at www.imstat.org

Time and Date TBA: Watch the JSM program for more information

Last year’s New Members’ Reception at JSM San Fransisco

Monday, August 9

5:15 – 6:45 pm

Fairmount Royal York Hotel

Salon A Room

Tuesday, August 10

5:15 – 6:45 pm

Fairmount Royal York Hotel

Confederation 3 Room

16 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

More IMS Meetings around the world

IMS Co-Sponsored Meeting,

2005 Conference on Stochastic Processes and their ApplicationsJune 26 - July 1, 2005Santa Barbara, California, USAIMS Rep: Raya Feldman. Meeting organized under the auspices of the Bernoulli Society, co-sponsored by IMS. More information athttp://www.pstat.ucsb.edu/projects/spa05/

The Joint Meeting of the Chinese Society of Probability and Statistics (CSPS) and IMSJuly 9-11, 2005Beijing, Chinahttp://math.bnu.edu.cn/statprob/CSPS-IMS2005/index.html

The joint meeting of the Chinese Society of Probability and Statistics (CSPS) and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics will take place in Beijing on July 9~12, 2005.

The venue of the meeting is Peking University, with accommodation offered in the nearby Friendship Hotel (shuttles will be provided between the university and the hotel).

As a city, Beijing offers many attractions both cultural and touristic. On behalf of the Program and Local Organizing Committees we are delighted to invite you to come to Beijing. Your participation will ensure that the 2005 CSPS/IMS joint meeting becomes an unforgettable scientific event.

The invited program covers a wide range of topics in statistics and probability, presenting recent and state-of-the-art developments in modern methodology research and applications such as nonparametric statistics, machine learning, finance, bioinformatics, environmental statistics, and information technology.

Submissions of contributed papers are invited to the conference website with a deadline of January 20, 2005.

Moreover, a half day sightseeing to the Great Wall during the meeting is planned and an after-meeting program and an accompanying persons program during the meeting are also being planned. Please visit the conference website for updates.

We look forward to meeting you in Beijing!Mufa Chen & Guoying Li, Chairs of the CSPS Program CommitteeBin Yu, Chair of the IMS Program CommitteeZhi Geng & Shuyuan He, Chairs of the Local Organizing Committee

NEW

Imag

e:

Ro

el d

e G

ama

Visit the Great Wall during your stay

QUOTE THIS!An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made in a very narrow field.

Niels Bohr (1885-1962)

New Directions inProbability Th eoryAugust 6–7, 2004 Fields Institute, Toronto, CanadaThe meeting New Directions in Probability Theory will take place on August 6–7, 2004; it is co-sponsored by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS) and the Fields Institute for Research in Mathematical Sciences. The meeting immediately precedes the Joint Statisti-cal Meetings, August 8–12, 2004 (co-sponsored by ASA, IMS, ENAR, WNAR, SSC). It will take place on Friday/Saturday and will be held at the Fields Institute.

The meeting consists of fi ve sessions and four one-hour lectures, of which two are IMS Medallion Lectures. It is intended for a general probability audience interested in recent developments in probability theory.

There will be no registration fee for the meeting. However, space at the Fields Institute is

limited, and so early registration is recommended.

Sessions:

Greg Lawler (Cornell University) Self-Avoiding WalksDavid Brydges (University of British Columbia): “Self-avoiding walk in four dimensions”; Tom Kennedy (University of Arizona): “Monte Carlo studies of self-avoiding walks”; Neal Madras (York University): “Knotting phenom-ena in self-avoiding walks”

Craig Tracy (University of California, Davis) Random MatricesJohn Harnad (Concordia University and CRM Université de Montreal): “Two matrix models, duality and Riemann-Hilbert problems”; Roland Speicher (Queen’s University): “Random matrices and free probability”

Mike Cranston (University of Rochester) Random MediaGerard Ben Arous (Courant Institute): “Dynamics of spin glasses; a generalized random energy model”; Leonid Koralov (Princeton University): “Asymptotic problems in random transport”; Stanislav Molchanov (University of North Carolina, Charlotte): “The spectral bifurcations in the large random systems”

Tom Salisbury (York University) SuperprocessesSiva Athreya (Indian Statistical Institute): “Branching coalescing particle systems”; Roger Tribe (Warwick): “Two parameter phase diagram for a stochastic reaction diffusion system”; Xiaowen Zhou (Concordia University): “Self-duality of coalescing Brownian motion and its applications in measure-valued processes”

Robin Pemantle (University of Pennsylvania) Markov Chains and AlgorithmsThomas P. Hayes (Toyota Technological Institute, Chicago): “Better coupling with less effort”; Mike Molloy (University of Toronto): “Markov chains on the colourings of a graph”; Robin Pemantle (University of Pennsylvania): “The complexity of fi nding a path with nearly optimal drift in a branching random walk”

One-Hour Lectures:

Kurt Johansson (Royal Institute of Technology): “Measures from non-intersecting paths” (IMS Medallion Lecture)Greg Lawler (Cornell University): “Self-avoiding walk in two dimensions: detailed conjectures and few results”Craig Tracy (University of California, Davis): “Differential equations for Dyson diffusion”H.T. Yau (Stanford University and Courant Institute): “Brownian motion in quantum dynamics” (IMS Medallion Lecture)

Program Organizer: Maury Bramson (University of Minnesota); Local Organizers: Jeremy Quastel and Jeffrey Rosenthal (University of Toronto), Tom Salisbury (York University)

More details at http://www.imstat.org/meetings/NDPT/

Sponsored by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and the Fields Institute for Research in Mathematical Sciences.

18 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

18 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 3

2004The Seventh North AmericanNew Researchers ConferenceAugust 4-6, 2004 (Just before JSM)

York UniversityToronto, Canada

Conference objective: To promote interaction among new Statistics researchers, by introducing them to each other’s research in an informal setting.

Who is eligible: Anyone who has received their PhD since 1999 in Statistics or a related fi eld is eligible to attend. All participants are expected to present a short talk or poster on their research.

Abstract Deadline: February 1, 2004

For more information: Peter Song (Program Chair), York Universitysong@mathstat.yorku.ca http://www.math.yorku.ca/StatsSection/NRC

IMS Sponsored Meeting

This was one of the best

conferences ever: good people, good talks, and lots of good

advice

The conference was

great! I liked the small size, as we had many opportunities

to get to know people

It was a fabulous

meeting

Very successful

What they said about NRC2003, held in Davis, California :

Pho

to: J

S N

eale

Looking further ahead…Here’s a list of IMS Annual Meetings and Joint Statistical Meetings (and other infor-mation, where it is known at this stage) for the next five years. Happy planning!

2005IMS Annual Meeting @ JSM05

August 7–11, 2005: Minneapolis Convention Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota.IMS Program Chair: David Madigan, Rutgers University, madigan@stat.rutgers.

edu; IMS Local Chair: Peihua Qiu, University of Minnesota, qiu@stat.umn.edu

2006IMS Annual Meeting: Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Date TBCJSM06

August 6–10, 2006Seattle Convention Center, Seattle, WashingtonIMS Program Chair: tba; IMS Local Chair: tba

2007IMS Annual Meeting @ JSM07

July 29 – August 2, 2007Salt Palace Convention Center, Salt Lake City, Utah

2008IMS Annual Meeting: venue TBCJSM08

August 3–7, 2008Denver, ColoradoTo be held at the Denver Convention Center

2009IMS Annual Meeting @ JSM09

August 2–6, 2009Washington, DCTo be held at the Washington Convention Center

“M C M Ski” IMS-ISBA 2005 Joint Meeting [See poster opposite]Young Investigator Travel Support There is still time to apply for financial support to attend the IMS-ISBA joint meeting in January 2005, for junior investigators presenting posters. NSF requires such investigators to be from US institutions (though not necessarily US citizens), and within 5 years of their PhD. Persons requesting travel support must submit the following items (by email to ims-isba@eco.uninsubria.it):

• current CV (.pdf or .ps)• copy of your paper (.pdf or .ps)• supporting note from your advisor

(can be just a paragraph)The deadline to ask for financial sup-

port is 10 September 2004. Those receiving travel awards will

have their registration and bus travel fees reimbursed by the conference. Please note however that if you register at this time, your credit card will be billed within 3 days.

The applications will be reviewed by the IMS-ISBA scientific committee, who will use the above criteria to select the recipients of the travel awards.

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 19

IMS Co-sponsored Meeting:

20 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Other Meetings Around the World: Announcements and Calls for Papers

If you are organizing a meeting, send in your announcement for the next issue (September/October 2004) by September 1, 2004 to Elyse Gustafson, IMS Executive Director, at erg@imstat.org. Adverts will also appear on the IMS website www.imstat.org. See panel inside back cover for more information.

The Third Winter Workshop on Statistics & Computer Science: Scientific Applications of Bayesian AnalysisDecember 5–6, 2004Ein-Gedi, Dead Sea, Israelhttp://www.cri.haifa.ac.il/events/2004/csstat/

csstat04.htm

This third Winter Workshop will bring Bayesian statisticians and decision theorists together with scientific practitioners who use, or may use, Bayesian methods in sci-entific research. Workshop participants will include leading researchers from statistics and computer science together with a range of applied social, natural, biomedical and engineering scientists, in a forum conducive to free-flowing exchange and discussion of Bayesian ideas and applied Bayesian methods. Invited presentations will address issues pervasive in scientific inference, recent developments in the theory, methods and computational aspects of Bayesian statistics and decision analysis, and various scientific applications.

Contact: Chair of the Organizing Committee, Yoel Haitovsky, msyoel@mscc.

huji.ac.il

Second Workshop on Monte Carlo MethodsAugust 27-28, 2004Sheraton Commander Hotel, Cambridge, MAhttp://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~junliu/workshop2004/

Harvard University will host this second Workshop on Monte Carlo Methods. It follows the successful workshop held two years ago on Cape Cod. The Monte Carlo method was initially developed for numerical integrations in statistical physics problems during the early days of electronic computing (1945-55). The past 20 years have seen a strong surge of interest in Monte Carlo methods from the scientific community. Due to the rapid progress in computer technology and the need of handling large datasets and complex systems, researchers ranging from computational biologist to engineers and to statisticians now view Monte Carlo techniques as indispensable tools. Besides using the popular Markov chain Monte Carlo strategies, they have also experimented with various sequential Monte Carlo strategies, resulting in an array of novel and effective inferential and optimization tools.

Topics will include theoretical analyses of MCMC, methods for estimating normalizing constants (e.g. Bayes factors), particle filters and mixture Kalman filters, sequential Monte Carlo optimizations, stochastic approximation, applications in bioinformatics, target track-ing, telecommunications, and financial modeling.

Deadline for registration and abstract submission is July 30th, 2004

Organizing Committee: Jun Liu, Harvard University (chair); Rong Chen, University of Illinois at Chicago; Xiaodong Wang, Columbia University.

Questions? Contact jliu@stat.harvard.edu

34th Annual Lloyd Roeling / University of Louisiana at Lafayette Mathematics Conference.November 19-21, 2004, University of Louisiana at LafayetteThis year the conference topic is statistics.http://www.louisiana.edu/Academic/Sciences/MATH/conference.html

There is no pre-registration and there is no registration fee. If you want to participate in this conference or desire more informa-tion about it, please contact a member of the organizing commit-tee: Bárbara González barbara@louisiana.edu, K Krishnamoorthy krishna@louisiana.edu or Nabendu Pal nxp3695@louisiana.edu

Fourth Symposium on Lévy Processes: Theory and Applications with a special day in honour of the 75 birthday of S James Taylor.10-14 January 2005Manchester Institute for Mathematical Sciences at the University of Manchester, UKhttp://www.ma.man.ac.uk/4levy-conference.html

Special breakout sessions will be chaired by B Hambly (Oxford) and T Kumagai (Kyoto) on “Fractals”, and A Kyprianou (Utrecht) on “Mathematical Finance”Organizers: Ron Doney (Manchester), Dave Applebaum (Nottingham Trent), Nick Bingham (Sheffield), Charles Goldie (Sussex) Rene Schilling (Sussex)For further information see the webpage or contact rad@maths.

man.ac.uk or r.schilling@sussex.ac.uk

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 21

IEEE International Workshop on Genomic Signal Processing and Statistics (GENSIPS), 2005May 22–24, 2005Newport, Rhode Island, USAhttp://binary.engin.brown.edu/gsps05/index.htm

Sponsored by IEEE Signal Processing Society with support from Brown University. Call for Papers

The aim of this one-day tutorial and two-day workshop is to provide a forum for pre-senting new results on genomic signal processing and statistics for functional genomics and systems biology and identifying potential areas of research and collaboration between the biological, statistical, and signal processing communities. One of the main objectives is to identify new avenues of research, which address modern challenges in functional genomics, by exploiting potential synergies between signal processing, statistics and biology and by building on their respective strengths. Such problem areas might include: signal processing and extraction of information from microarray images; statistical analysis of microarray data (classification, gene selection, regulatory network inference, and clustering); informa-tion theoretic approaches to modeling and analysis of genomic regulatory networks and systems; signal processing and statistical techniques for the analysis of protein data and inference of protein networks; and novel high-throughput hardware/software approaches to genome-scale network modeling and analysis. This workshop will consist of both invited sessions and contributed sessions. Invited speakers will give tutorial talks on the general area of computational functional genomics and proteomics. Featured expert panels will stimulate the discussions of future directions and funding opportunities.

Those interested should submit a two-page summary describing original work. The final version of accepted papers will be published in electronic proceedings which will be distrib-uted by the web and by CD-ROM at the workshop. Acceptance will be based on quality, relevance and originality.

Areas of Interest (but not limited to): * Signal processing and statistical approaches for functional genomics problems * Information technology approaches for modeling and analysis of gene networks * Data mining and pattern recognition methods for functional genomics * Control theory and systems theory techniques for systems biology * Models for cellular metabolism and inter-cellular signaling * Computational methods for modeling and simulation of biological regulatory networks * Novel architecture and implementation methods for large-scale functional genomics* Nanotechnology in genomic study* High-throughput hardware/software approaches to genome-scale network modeling

Deadline for receipt of two page summaries: December 1, 2004

For detailed submission instructions, please visit the workshop web page.Contact: Dr Aniruddha Datta, Texas A&M University (datta@ee.tamu.edu); Dr Jie

Chen, Brown University (jie_chen@brown.edu)

Recent Advances in Biostatistics, Bioinfor-matics and Markov Chain Monte Carlo7-8 July 2005University of New South Wales, Sydney Australia

Biostatistics and Markov chain Monte Carlo are two of the most vibrant current areas of statistical research. The analysis of experimental data under alternative biologi-cal hypotheses in highly complex modeling situations is becoming increasingly com-monplace. Models based on genetic and biological applications have traditionally provided a challenge for stochastic simula-tion techniques due to their complex local dependency structures, and the unique modelling circumstances generated by the experimental design. This symposium will focus on statistical issues in both Biostatistical and MCMC fields. Cross-dis-ciplinary research will also be presented.

Invited Speakers: Chris Carter (CSIRO); Liang Faming (NUS Singapore); Peter Green (Bristol University); Robert Kohn (University of New South Wales); Michael Newton (University of Wisconsin-Madison); Geoff Nicholls (University of Auckland); David Nott (University of New South Wales); Sylvia Richardson (Imperial College, London). Contact: biomcmc@maths.unsw.edu.au

http://www.maths.unsw.edu.au/~scott/

symposium

ASMDA2005 XI International Symposium on Applied Stochastic Models and Data AnalysisMay 17-20, 2005Brest, Francehttp://asmda2005.enst-bretagne.fr

Symposium General Chairs: JP Barthélemy, N Limnios and G Saporta.Information: asmda2005-organisation@enst-

bretagne.fr

22 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

ISI 2005 in SydneyApril 5–12, 2005The world’s premier statistical conference - the 2005 International Statistical Institute (ISI) Session - is scheduled for Sydney, Australia in April 5-12 2005.

Professional statisticians, plus those who want to stay in touch with latest developments in the field, will find it of great interest and should register their interest now.

The session will feature leading keynote speakers and more than 100 scientific sessions. Special theme days will cater for those with interests in finance and statistics, environmental statistics and

genomics.

The scientific program will be supplemented by tutorials and short courses. There will also be satellite meetings, before and after ISI 2005, at interesting locations such as Cairns (gateway to the Great Barrier Reef ), Auckland and Wellington in New Zealand, and New Caledonia.

Sydney, host to the 2000 Olympics, is one of the world’s favou-rite tourist destinations and April is one of the best times of the year to visit. It’s warm enough to swim at Bondi Beach (the average

temperature is 20 degrees Celsius in Sydney) and being off-peak season there are fewer tour-ists around, making it a great time to visit.

Register your interest now at www.tourhosts.com.

au/isi2005, and start planning for the 2005 ISI Session.

For more details on the 2005 ISI Session see the ISI 2005 website above, or email the confer-ence managers on isi2005@tourhosts.

com.au

“Come to Sydney!” Stephen M. Stigler (left) President of the International Statistical Institute, and Daniel Berze, Director of the Institute, pictured during a site inspection in Sydney this year.

Not as alarming as it looks:Entrance to Luna Park, venue of the ‘Australiana Night’,

one of the social activities being organized for delegates

Conference on Stochastics in Science, in honor of Ole E Barndorff-Nielsen’s 71st Birthday. March 20-24, 2006CIMAT, Guanajuato, Mexico.Further information pabreu@cimat.mx

These meetings are also listed on the ‘Meetings’ page

of the IMS website, at http://www.imstat.org/meetings

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 23

Employment Opportunities around the world

Australia: Victoria

Research FellowCentre for Modelling of Stochastic SystemsSchool of Mathematical SciencesMonash University, Clayton, VictoriaApplications are invited for a postdoctoral research fellow for a two year fi xed term contract, starting September 2004, to work on a project on the mathematical modelling of stochastic systems within the Centre for Modelling of Stochastic Systems. Th e Centre is a joint venture of the School of Mathematical Sciences and the Department of Econometrics and Business Statistics. Applicants should be active researchers and have a PhD in stochastic processes or a related discipline.

Salary range: $49,525-53,163 per annum, (Research Fellow Level A)Location: Clayton campus.Enquiries: Prof Fima Klebaner, Prof Don Poskitt, Tel: 61-3-9905-4409 Fax: 61-3-9905-9520 Tel: 61-3-9905-9378 Fax: 61-3-9905-5474 Email: Fima.Klebaner@sci.monash.edu.au Email: Don.Poskitt@buseco.monash.edu.au

Applicants should send a CV, list of publications, and the names and contact addresses of three referees by July 30, 2004 to Prof Fima Klebaner, School of Mathematical Sciences, PO Box 28, Monash University, Victoria 3800, Australia

Quote reference number A045141. Applicants are advised to address the selection criteria as outlined in the PD.

An Equal Opportunity Employer

The jobs page on the IMS website

is updated regularly. Check it out at

http://www.imstat.org/jobs

24 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

Hong Kong: ShatinThe Chinese University of Hong KongInstructor(s) / Assistant Professor(s)Applications are invited for Department of Statistics Instructor(s) / Assistant Professor(s) (Ref. 04/078(408)/2).

Applicants should have (i) a PhD degree; and (ii) strong research and teaching records or potential in statistics and closely related areas. Applicants with exceptionally strong credentials may be considered for appointment at a higher level. The appointee will

(a) teach undergraduate and postgraduate courses in the areas of statistics and risk management; (b) conduct high quality research; and (c) render service to the department. Appointments will be made on a fixed-term contract basis for ten months commencing mid-August 2004. Applications will be

accepted until the position(s) is/are filled.Salary and Fringe Benefits: salary will be highly competitive and the level of appointment commensurate with qualifications and expe-

rience. The University offers a comprehensive fringe benefit package.Further information about the University and the general terms of service for teaching appointees is available at http://www.cuhk.edu.

hk/personnel. The terms mentioned herein are for reference only and are subject to revision by the University.Application Procedure: Please send full resume, copies of academic credentials, a publication list and/or abstracts of selected published

papers, together with names, addresses and fax numbers/e-mail addresses of three referees to whom applicants’ consent has been given for their providing references (unless otherwise specified), to the Personnel Office, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, New Territories, Hong Kong (Fax: (852) 2603 6852). The Personal Information Collection Statement will be provided upon request. Please quote the reference number and mark ‘Application - Confidential’ on cover.

Acadia University, Wolfville, NS, CanadaPostdoctoral FellowshipThe Department of Mathematics and Statistics invites applications for a Postdoctoral Fellowship in Statistical Learning and Data Mining.

Recent or expected PhD, to start Fall 2004 or later. One year position, with pos-sible renewal for a second year.

Analysis of network data, feature selection, stochastic search and data visu-alization. We are especially interested in a candidate with computational skills, ability to work with large data sets, and familiarity with supervised and unsupervised statistical learning methods.

See http://ace.acadiau.ca/math/employ-

ment.htm for details.Email a CV, statement of research inter-

ests, and names of three potential referees to postdocmath@acadiau.ca

Director, School of Operations Research & Industrial EngineeringCornell UniversityThe School of Operations Research and Industrial Engineering at Cornell University is initiating an external search for a senior faculty member to serve as its next Director. This individual should be of stature commensurate with the School’s reputation, with the requi-site skills to lead the School over the next several years, starting by the summer of 2005.

Interested parties should contact current faculty of the School, the search committee’s co-chairs, Professors Robin Roundy and David Shmoys, or send email to director-

search@orie.cornell.edu More information about the School can be found at http://www.orie.cornell.edu

Women and minority candidates are especially encouraged to apply. Cornell University is an AA/EOE.

Send your job advert to Elyse Gustafson for the September/October 2004 issue

by September 1, 2004 See the “Information for Advertisers” panel inside the

back cover, especially if you want a logo included!

USA: New YorkCanada: Nova Scotia

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 25

July 2004July 4–7: Sydney, Australia. 24th International Symposium on Forecasting w http://www.isf2004.org

July 4–11: Copenhagen, Denmark. 10th International Congress on Mathematical Education. w http://www. icme-10.dk

July 6–8: Leeds, UK. Bioinformatics, Images, and Wavelets. e workshop@maths.

leeds.ac.uk w http://www.maths.leeds.ac.uk/

statistics/workshop/

July 11–16: Cairns, Australia. International Biometrics Conference 2004 and 2004 Australian Statistical Conference Contact Lynne Billard, lynne@stat.uga.edu w http://

www.ozaccom.com.au/cairns2004

July 14–18: Neuchâtel, Switzerland. Cele-brating Statistics: International Conference in Honour of Sir David Cox on the Occa-sion of his 80th Birthday. w http://www.

unine.ch/statistics/cox/welcome.htm

July 17–24: Snowbird, Utah. Joint Summer Research Conferences IMS/AMS/SIAM sponsored e r.vitale@uconn.edu

July 19–24: Montreal, Canada. Stochastic Networks Conference w http://www.stan-

ford.edu/group/stochnetconf/

July 21–23: NUS, Singapore. Inter-national Chinese Statistical Association Applied Statistics Symposium. Co-spon-sored meeting. IMS Rep: Louis Chen lhychen@ims.nus.edu.sg w http://www.statis-

tics.nus.edu.sg/ICSA.htm

July 26–30: Barcelona, Spain. 67th IMS Annual Meeting & 6th Bernoulli World Congress. Joint Program Chair: Wilfrid Kendall wsk@stats.warwick.ac.uk Local Chair: David Nualart nualart@mat.

ub.es w http://www. imub.ub.es/events/

wc2004/

July 27–31: University of Lugano, Switzerland. Summer School on Imprecise Probabilities. Marco Zaffalon (school orga-nizer) Senior Researcher, IDSIA, Galleria 2, CH-6928 Manno (Lugano), Switzerland. t +41 91 610 8665. f +41 91 610 8661. e zaffalon@idsia.ch w http://www.idsia.

ch/~zaffalon/events/school2004/school.htm

August 2004

August 4–6: York University, Toronto. New Researchers Conference: NRC2004 Peter Song (Program Chair), York Univer-sity, song@mathstat.yorku.ca w http://www.

math.yorku.ca/StatsSection/NRC

August 6–7: Fields Institute, Toronto. New Directions in Probability Theory IMS Program Chair: Maury Bramson bramson@math.umn.edu w http://www.

imstat.org/meetings/ndpt

August 8–12: Toronto, Canada. Joint Statistical Meetings (ASA/IMS/ENAR/WNAR). Sponsored/Numbered. IMS Pro-gram Chair: Michael Evans, U of Toronto e

mevans@utstat.utoronto.ca

August 8: Toronto, Canada. D Basu Lecture at JSM04, presented by the Friends of the Indian Statistical Institute. Contact Sujay Datta sdatta@euclid.acs.nmu.edu or Nitis Mukhopadhyay mukhop@uconnvm.

uconn.edu

August 15–20: The Rensselaerville Institute, Rensselaerville NY. CBMS Conference: Non-Positive Curvature in Group Theory. Martin Bridson, lecturer. Ted Turner, SUNY at Albany, organizer: 518-442-4610, ted@math.albany.edu. http://math.albany.

edu/~ted/cbms.html

August 18-21: Bedlewo, near Poznan, Poland. 13th International Workshop on Matrices and Statistics, in Celebration of Ingram Olkin’s 80th Birthday. Contact Augustyn Markiewicz amark@owl.

au.poznan.pl or http://matrix04.amu.edu.pl/

August 23–27: Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic. Compstat2004. w http://

www.compstat2004.cuni.cz

NEW August 27-28: Sheraton Commander Hotel, Cambridge, MA. Second Workshop on Monte Carlo Methods, hosted by Harvard University. w

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~junliu/

workshop2004/ Contact jliu@stat.harvard.

edu

August 30–September 3: Laredo, Spain. EMS Summer School: Empirical Processes and Statistical Applications Grants avail-able. w http://www.eio.uva.es/ems

September 2004

September 2–4: Oviedo, Edificio Histórico, Spain. 2nd International Conference on Soft Methods in Probability and Statistics: SMPS2004. http://web.uniovi.es/SMPS

Program Chairs: María Angeles Gil & Miguel López-Díaz (University of Oviedo). Contact: Luis J. Rodríguez-Muñiz, smps2004@correo.uniovi.es

International Calendar of Statistical EventsIMS meetings are highlighted in maroon with the logo and new or updated entries have the NEW symbol. t means telephone, f fax, e email and w website. Please send additions and corrections to Tati Howell at bulletin@imstat.org

Continued on page 26

26 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

International Calendar continued

20-24 September, 2004: Coimbra, CIM, and 26-30 September, 2004: Lisbon, Inst. Sup. Economia Gestão, Portugal. Stochastic Finance 2004: Autumn School & International Conference. Organiz-ers: Chair: Maria do Rosário Grossinho (Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestão, Lisbon, Portugal). w http://pascal.iseg.utl.

pt/~stochfin2004/

November 2004NEW November 19-21: University

of Louisiana at Lafayette. 34th Annual Lloyd Roeling/University of Louisiana at Lafayette Mathematics Conference: con-ference topic “Statistics”. w http://www.

louisiana.edu/Academic/Sciences/MATH/

conference.html Organizing committee: Bárbara González barbara@louisiana.edu, K Krishnamoorthy krishna@louisiana.edu or Nabendu Pal nxp3695@louisiana.edu

December 2004NEW December 5–6: Ein-Gedi, Dead

Sea, Israel. Third Winter Workshop on Statistics & Computer Science: Scientific Applications of Bayesian Analysis. w

http://www.cri.haifa.ac.il/events/2004/

csstat/csstat04.htm Contact: Chair of the Organizing Committee, Yoel Haitovsky, msyoel@mscc.huji.ac.il

December 28–30: Kandy, Sri Lanka. Inter-national Sri Lankan Statistical Conference: Visions of Futuristic Statistical Meth-odologies. Organizers: Basil M. de Silva (desilva@rmit.edu.au), Nitis Mukhopadhyay, Tim Swartz and S. Ganesalingam. w http://

www.st.rmit.edu.au/~desilva/conference/

slstat.htm

December 29–1 January 2005: Birla Science Museum, Hyderabad, India. International Conference on the Future of Statistical Theory, Practice and Education.

e crr1@psu.edu w http://www.stat.ohio-state.

edu/~hnn/hydstatconf.html

January 2005

January 6-8: Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India. International Workshop/Conference on Bayesian Statistics and its Applications. http://www.bayesian.

org/ Contact S.K. Upadhyay, Convener, sku@bhu.ac.in

January 7–9: Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode, Calicut, Kerala, India. International Conference on Reliability, Statistics, and Related Fields (ICRSRF). w http://www.iimk.

ac.in/icrsrf.htm Contacts: Dr G Chaudhuri chaudhuri@iimk.ac.in or Dr R P Suresh rps@iimk.ac.in

NEW January 10-14 : Manchester Institute for Mathematical Sciences, UK. Fourth Symposium on Lévy Processes: Theory and Applications with a special day in honour of the 75 birthday of S James Taylor. w http://www.ma.man.ac.uk/4levy-

conference.html Contact Ron Doney rad@maths.man.ac.uk or Rene Schilling r.schilling@sussex.ac.uk

January 12–14: Bormio, Italian Alps. Second International IMS/ISBA Joint Meeting “MCMSki”: The Past, Present and Future of Gibbs Sampling. Brad Carlin and Antonietta Mira (Co-chairs) w http://eco.

uninsubria.it/webdocenti/IMS-ISBA-05/

February 2005

15-17 February 2005, Beer Sheva, Israel. The International Symposium on Stochastic Models In Reliability, Safety, Security and Logistics (SMRSSL’05). Dr Ilia B. Frenkel, Industrial Engineering and Management Department, Negev Academic College of Engineering (NACE), Bialik/Bazel Sts.,

P.O. Box 45, Beer Sheva, 84100, ISRAEL. t: +972-8-6475642; f: +972-8-6475643; e: SMRSSL05@nace.ac.il w http://www.nace.

ac.il/extra/SMRSSL05/

April 2005

April 5–12: Sydney, Australia. ISI 2005: 55th Biennial Session. Contact Annette Hants, isi2005@tourhosts.com.au http://

www.tourhosts.com.au/isi2005

April 13–16: Cairns, Tropical North Queensland, Australia. Fourth International Conference on Statistics in Business and Industry: ISBIS-4. A satellite meeting to the ISI Session in Sydney. Conference Director, Nick Fisher nif@valuemetrics.

com.au, t +61 407 017 016 w www.action-

m.com/isbis4

May 2005NEW May 17-20: Brest, France.

ASMDA2005: XI International Symposium on Applied Stochastic Models and Data Analysis. w http://asmda2005.

enst-bretagne.fr Symposium General Chairs: JP Barthélemy, N Limnios and G Saporta. Information: asmda2005-organisation@enst-

bretagne.fr

NEW May 22–24: Newport, Rhode Island, USA. IEEE International Workshop on Genomic Signal Processing and Statistics (GENSIPS), 2005. w http://

binary.engin.brown.edu/gsps05/index.htm

Contact: Aniruddha Datta, Texas A&M University datta@ee.tamu.edu or Jie Chen, Brown University jie_chen@brown.edu

May 23-26: University of Siena, Italy. Inter-national Conference in Memory of Two Eminent Social Scientists: C. Gini and M. O. Lorenz. Contact Prof. Achille Lemmi, Chairman Organizing Committee:

July/August . 2004 IMS Bulletin . 27

June 2005June 12–15: Saskatoon, Canada. SSC2005: Annual Meeting of the Statistical Society of Canada. e bickis@math.usask.ca

Program information: Augustine Wong at august@mathstat.yorku.ca

June 26–July 1: Santa Barbara, Cali-fornia. 2005 Conference on Stochastic Processes and their Applications. IMS Rep Raya Feldman w http://www.pstat.ucsb.edu/

projects/spa05

July 2005NEW July 7–8: University of New

South Wales, Sydney Australia. Recent Advances in Biostatistics, Bioinformatics and Markov Chain Monte Carlo. Contact:biomcmc@maths.unsw.edu.au w http://www.

maths.unsw.edu.au/~scott/symposium

NEW July 9–11: Beijing, China. Th e Joint Meeting of the Chinese Society of Probability and Statistics (CSPS) and IMS. w http://math.bnu.edu.cn/statprob/

CSPS-IMS2005/index.html

July 24–29: Oslo, Norway. 25th European Meeting of Statisticians Organized by the Bernoulli Society. w http://www.ems2005.no

August 2005

August 7–11: Minneapolis, Minnesota. IMS Annual Meeting at JSM2005. IMS Program Chair: David Madigan, Rutgers University, madigan@stat.rutgers.edu; IMS Local Chair: Peihua Qiu, University of Minnesota, qiu@stat.umn.edu

March 2006NEW March 20-24, 2006: CIMAT,

Guanajuato, Mexico. Conference on Stochastics in Science, in honor of Ole E Barndorff -Nielsen’s 71st Birthday. Further information pabreu@cimat.mx

July 2006July 2–7: Salvador (Bahia) Brazil. ICOTS7Working Co-operatively in Statistics Educa-tion w http://www.maths.otago.ac.nz/icots7

July 3–6: Auckland, New Zealand. Australian Statistics Conference & New Zealand Statistical Association Conference. David Scott e d.scott@auckland.ac.nz

July 10–23: Cornell University, New York. Summer School in Probability. w http://www.math.cornell.edu/~lawler/

sum2005.html or contact Greg Lawler at lawler@math.cornell.edu

August 2006August 6–10: Washington, Seattle.

JSM2006.

August 2007

July 29 – August 2: Salt Lake City, Utah. IMS Annual Meeting at JSM2007.

August 2008

August 3–8: Denver, Colorado. JSM2008.

August 2009

August 2–6: Washington, DC. IMS Annual Meeting at JSM2009.

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28 . IMS Bulletin Volume 33 . Issue 4

In the next issue (September/ October 04) Reports from the IMS Annual Meeting, profi les of award recipients, as well as news of members around the world, meeting announcements and job opportunities. Send in your articles, feedback, letters…

Deadline for submissions:September 1, 2004(Submissions in MS Word or plain text, please: see panel on page 2 for Bulletin contact details)

Th e small print:Journals: Th e scientifi c journals of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics are Statistical Science, Th e Annals of Statistics, Th e Annals of Probability and Th e Annals of Applied Probability. Th e IMS Bulletin is the news organ of the Institute.

Individual and Organizational Memberships: Each individual member receives the IMS Bulletin and may elect to receive one or more of the four scientifi c journals. Members pay annual dues of $75. An additional amount is added to the dues of members depending on the scientifi c journal selected as follows: Statistical Science ($15), Th e Annals of Statistics ($30), Th e Annals of Probability ($25), and Th e Annals of Applied Probability ($20). Of the total dues paid, $29 is allocated to the Bulletin and the remaining amount is allocated among the scientifi c journals received. Reduced membership dues are available to full-time students, new graduates, permanent residents of countries designated by the IMS Council, and retired members. Organizational memberships are available to institutions at $595 per year and to corporations at $850 per year. Organizational memberships include two multiple-readership copies of all IMS journals in addition to other benefi ts specifi ed for each category (details available from the IMS Business Offi ce).

Individual and General Subscriptions: Subscriptions are available on a calendar-year basis. Individual subscriptions are for the personal use of the subscriber and must be in the name of, paid directly by, and mailed to an individual. Individual subscriptions for 2004 are avail-able to Th e Annals of Applied Probability ($95), Th e Annals of Probability ($100), Th e Annals of Statistics ($105), IMS Bulletin ($60), and Statistical Science ($90). General subscriptions are for libraries, institutions, and any multiple-readership use. General subscriptions for 2004 are available to Th e Annals of Applied Probability ($130), Th e Annals of Probability ($200), Th e Annals of Statistics ($220), IMS Bulletin ($60), and Statistical Science ($110). Airmail rates for delivery outside North America are $80 per title (excluding IMS Bulletin).

Th e IMS Bulletin publishes articles and news of interest to IMS members and to statisticians and probabilists in general, as well as details of IMS meetings and an international calendar of statistical events. Views and opinions in editorials and articles are not to be understood as offi cial expressions of the Institute’s policy unless so stated; publication does not necessarily imply endorsement in any way of the opinions expressed therein, and the IMS Bulletin and its publisher do not accept any responsibility for them. Th e IMS Bulletin is copyrighted and authors of individual articles may be asked to sign a copyright transfer to the IMS before publication.

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statistics and probabilityIMS: Organized September 12, 1935